


Contingency Plans: Debrief

by hypatia



Series: The Incredibly True Adventures of 2 Hackers in Love [5]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Leverage
Genre: Drug (Sedative) mentions, HaQ, M/M, Minor Alec Hardison/Parker/Eliot Spencer, Multi, Nerdy flirtatious banter is their love language, Original Character Death(s), Suicidal Ideation Mention, Trust, Veteran!Q, Why Q Doesn't Fly, fake suicide, rogue!Q
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:40:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22488046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hypatia/pseuds/hypatia
Summary: An African American man about Q’s age was carrying a mug of tea and a glass of a violently orange beverage to the booth where the crutches leaned. “Tea. Earl Grey. Hot,” he said to the unseen occupant, setting down the mug. He was watching Bond and didn’t move to sit down.“Scruffy looking nerf-herder,” said a voice Bond could pick out of a riot or a firefight, easily recognizable in a quiet bar.“Who’s scruffy looking?” the man asked, then he jerked his chin toward Bond and said in a quieter voice. “Just arrived. Moves like Eliot.”“That would be Bond,” said Q.
Relationships: Alec Hardison/Q (James Bond), James Bond & Q
Series: The Incredibly True Adventures of 2 Hackers in Love [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1568371
Comments: 15
Kudos: 123





	Contingency Plans: Debrief

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Zandraeliox for their continuing dedication to beta reading!

**[Unknown number]:** RMS Lusitania passenger John McCrory arriving Boston Thurs 1400 local.

An online search revealed that John McCrory was not a person but a pub in Boston; a bar and eatery with a modest reputation that would likely be nearly empty mid-afternoon.

Before approaching, Bond walked past on the opposite side of the street getting a feel for the neighborhood, traffic patterns, and alternate exits. The pub was in the lower portion of a building, down a half flight from street level. Exiting in a hurry would be slowed. Earlier, he’d driven through the alley behind the pub and identified the rear entrance with its ramp for bringing in deliveries.

When he entered, he paused for a moment as if letting his eyes adjust to the change in light in order look around. There was a bar to the left, a few tables in the center of the room, and a row of booths with high dividers that hid any occupants. Toward the back, a pair of forearm crutches leaned next to one of the booths.

Near the entrance, a large group of office workers appeared to have just finished lunch. A waiter was returning credit cards and handing out pens. She paused to tell him she’d be with him in a moment, please sit anywhere.

At the bar, two patrons were seated next to each other. Both looked up as he entered. The one seated nearer the door was a petite blonde woman with the arm muscles of a serious rock climber. The other, a man with shoulder length brown hair looked Bond over in an undisguised threat assessment. _Ex-military, probably American special forces_ thought Bond, completing his own assessment.

An African American man about Q’s age was carrying a mug of tea and a glass of a violently orange beverage to the booth where the crutches leaned. “Tea. Earl Grey. Hot,” he said to the unseen occupant, setting down the mug. He was watching Bond and didn’t move to sit down.

“Scruffy looking nerf-herder,” said a voice Bond could pick out of a riot or a firefight, easily recognizable in a quiet bar.

“Who’s scruffy looking?” the man asked, then he jerked his chin toward Bond and said in a quieter voice. “Just arrived. Moves like Eliot.”

“That would be Bond,” said Q.

Bond skirted around the departing lunch group and made his way over to the booth.

Q wore a turtleneck jumper, black with silver and blue stripes at the wrists and charcoal grey trousers. He was wearing the glasses he’d worn when they first met three years before.

“Q.”

“007.”

“MI6 thinks you’re dead.”

Q’s mouth quirked into a near smile. “I should bloody well hope so. I could say the same about you.”

“Rather dramatic wasn’t it?”

“More of a… personal statement. And my fireball was much smaller than yours. So let’s not speak of dramatic.”

“My fireball was very nearly a command performance,” Bond pointed out.

“It _was_ rather indulgent of me. I’ll be interested to know what you’ve heard about mine though. I put a lot of effort into that.”

“Excuse me?” said the man who’d brought Q his tea.

“Sorry Alec. _We_ put a lot of effort into that.” He gestured toward Bond. “James, Alec Hardison. Alec, James Bond.”

“Most people call me Hardison,” said the man, offering his hand. “He calls me Alec because we’ve known each other since we were twelve.”

Bond took the offered hand, trying to assess who this ‘Hardison’ was. He was fit, but not a highly trained fighter. He gripped Bond’s hand and looked him in the eye with laidback self-assurance. He clearly recognized that Bond was sizing him up as a potential threat.

“We can’t let him anywhere near Eliot, can we?” said Hardison to Q. The man at the bar snorted but said nothing.

Q nodded. “House afire, one way or another. Say goodbye, Alec.”

The man rolled his eyes theatrically and grinned. “Goodbye Alec. Man, why are all your jokes older than you?”

“That was your joke.”

“And your setup. Whatever. I’ll let the two of you catch up.”

“And that is?” asked Bond watching the man retreat.

Q smiled “ _My_ friend Alec.” Bond narrowed his eyes impatiently. “Alec Hardison is a hacker. Perhaps one of the three most dangerous people in the Americas. If he wanted to be anyway.”

“Counting you?”

Q shrugged.

“And the soldier he just sat down next to?”

“One of his partners, Eliot Spencer, whom you’ve probably…”

“I know him by reputation, yes. Should I presume the blonde is equally formidable?”

“Indeed. That’s Parker, a thief of... some renown.”

“Was she the one that nearly succeeded in stealing the crown jewels?”

“That’s her.”

“Romantic or business partners?”

“Both actually. Call them… a Robin Hood crew… Robin Hood and her Merry Men”. Q laughed abruptly with genuine delight and turned toward the bar. “Alec!”

“Yeah?”

“ _Disney’s_ Robin Hood,” Q said firmly, as if continuing a prior conversation.

Hardison looked at Q for several seconds, started to nod, and then said, “Oh hell no. I am NOT Maid Marian.”

“But why not?” asked Q flirtatiously “She’s a real fox.”

“So’s Robin Hood,” said Hardison petulantly.

“We all know Parker is Robin Hood.”

“Does that make me Friar Tuck or Little John?” asked Eliot.

“Depends on whether you want to be a balding badger or Baloo in a green suit,” said Parker, and the two of them promptly started squabbling about _The Jungle Book_.

Q leaned back in his seat shaking with laughter.

While waiting for Q to regain his composure, Bond couldn’t help glancing at the crutches leaning next to the booth.

“Go ahead and ask,” said Q, following the gaze.

“Were you injured?”

“Yes. But not recently.” Q shifted to the edge of the booth and pulled up his left trouser leg to reveal a prosthetic that appeared 3D-printed out of grey plastic.

“I damaged some equipment and had to leave it behind in Afghanistan,” said Q in his usual unperturbed tone. “And while the RAF was kind enough to provide me with replacements, I left those in a bunker in London several days ago. I printed a temporary alternative, but it’s painfully inadequate. Emphasis on painful, unfortunately. So… I’ll use those,” he nodded toward the crutches, “until I can fabricate a suitable replacement.”

Q grimaced. “Possibly the hardest part of this whole exercise was walking out of headquarters without a visible limp that evening. Once I was out of London, I tried to reassure myself this would make me harder to spot. Without the crutches, people notice the limp not my face. With the crutches, I might as well be invisible.”

Bond had many, many questions, but settled on, “Why hide that? It might’ve saved you time gaining the trust of some of the more… reluctant agents.”

“ _You_ didn’t need it.” Q pointed out.

“M picked you. I trusted her with my life. And you’re obviously insanely competent.”

“I didn’t hide it Bond. It’s irrelevant. Anyone who would be more impressed by ‘combat wounded RAF officer’ than by ‘obvious competence’ in _whatever_ form that takes, clearly lacks the critical thinking skills required for an effective field agent.”

“Q… was that a compliment?” asked Bond.

Q pretended to think for a moment. “Might have been.” He smiled wryly, “and let’s be honest, a taste for gallows humor is about the only trait all the 00s share. If you lot had known, I’d _never_ have been able to lecture you about caring for and returning equipment intact without a joke about it.”

“True.” Bond conceded with a thoughtful smirk and decided to change the subject. “How do you know Hardison and his friends?”

“We’re both hackers. It can be a smaller world than you might think.”

The waiter stopped by at that point and Bond asked for a coffee.

“There must be more to it than that,” said Bond after she’d retreated.

“Of course, but it quickly reveals rather a lot about me that I don’t tend to share.”

“I won’t press, Q, but you’ve probably memorized my file and I don’t even know how old you are.”

“I’m 34.”

“All I know about you,” said Bond, ignoring the interruption, “beyond that you are… were?... remarkably good at your job, is that you like Earl Grey, dress like a Prada model, and that you won’t fly.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “And that you make _obscene_ noises when you think about fuel-air explosions.”

At this point, Alec, who had clearly been listening, turned around and grinned at Q. “You have something to say? Alec?” asked Q pointedly.

“I’ve heard those noises, man. He’s not wrong.”

“Fuck you, Hardison,” said Q without heat.

“Promises, promises,” said Hardison with a _definitely_ heated smile.

Bond looked between the two men in surmise. “You and Hardison… were… are you…” Bond trailed off and Q simply waited, expression bland, eyebrows slightly raised for Bond to continue. “I mean.” He glanced to the side and saw that Hardison was still facing them and watching Bond with some amusement.

“There’s a good chance I’ll answer, but you have to actually ask a question,” said Q visibly suppressing a smirk.

“Glad I amuse you,” muttered Bond. “Are you sleeping with him?”

“See? That wasn’t difficult,” Q smiled. “Not at present.”

Hardison laughed out loud, drawing Bond’s attention. “Do not forget that he’s the most pedantic bastard on the planet,” he warned.

“So, you have…” Bond continued.

Q leaned forward abruptly. “Yes. Frequently.” He gave an emphatic nod toward Alec. “Have you _seen him_?”

Hardison gave Bond a smug grin and turned back to the bar.

The waiter arrived with Bond’s coffee at this point and he sipped it trying to get his bearings.

“We were hackers together before I joined the RAF,” said Q. “When I joined MI6… a relationship with someone wanted by both Interpol _and_ the FBI seemed… less than prudent.”

“And you can talk?” snorted Alec.

“MI6 was very forgiving about that when they decided I could be useful,” said Q primly.

Bond had a mental image of the two men. Perhaps in their early 20s. In a cheap flat, surrounded by laptops. Hacking corporations or governments all night, then curled up together to sleep and... _not sleep_ all day. It was... distracting.

"Did we lose you there for a moment Bond?" Q asked bemused. He sipped his tea and chuckled.

“Never seen you in such a fey mood,” muttered Bond.

“Ha!” snorted Q. “You’ve _never_ seen me without a massive sleep debt and the security of some portion of the free world in my hands. Plus, I just spent eight of the last nine days with no internet and limited human contact. You’d be a bit fey too.”

Bond took a moment to process that. “Freighter in the middle of the Atlantic?” he asked.

Q nodded. “Freighter in the middle of the Atlantic.”

“I assume that you didn’t just invite me here to chat Q.”

“I didn’t. But you’re the one who brought up my sex life.”

“You were talking about anthropomorphic foxes,” Bond said a bit irritably.

“Did you… think that anthropomorphic foxes have something to do with my sex life?” asked Q with a bemused smile.

Bond opened his mouth, then closed it again. _What_ , he thought, _was going on with this conversation_?

Hardison turned toward them again, opening his mouth to speak. “Shut up Alec,” said Q.

“Man, it’s right there.”

“If you keep going for the low hanging fruit, your jokes are never going to improve.”

“Q,” said Bond.

Spencer, who’d clearly also been listening the entire time, turned toward them now too. “You’re just going to have to get used to it,” he said to Bond in a tone that said, ‘welcome to my life’. He nodded toward Q. “They’ve been like this since he got here.”

Q took a swallow of his tea. “Right. Work.” he said, trying to regain focus. “Earl Grey isn’t actually my favorite. I only drink it while working. A reminder of where I was and who I needed to be. Part of the uniform. Rather like your suits, I suspect.”

“And the expensive designer jumpers?”

“Oh, those I’m quite fond of.” Q smiled beatifically over his tea.

Bond glanced at the mug. “So, this is work?”

Q sobered. “Well, until a fortnight ago, you were my responsibility. And though we’ve both… retired, you’re still a former colleague for whom I have great respect. It seemed a debrief was in order.”

Bond looked around the bar. “Here? How secure is this place?”

“Well, Parker has tested the security system thoroughly, Hardison is a better hacker than I am, and Eliot Spencer is sitting at the bar. I’m not _particularly_ worried.”

“Better than you?” Bond raised his eyebrows.

Q nodded. “He’s more of a specialist. My work with Q-branch exercised a broader range of skills, with a concomitant reduction in the time I could devote to any particular area.”

“Why contact me at all? Why am I here?”

“I didn’t want you killing anyone because you thought I might actually be dead. Particularly since you, unlike anyone at MI6, might suspect I’d been killed rather than committing suicide. And I couldn’t think of a single message that I could send that you would be certain to believe was from me. So, it had to be in person.”

“That’s a huge risk to take Q.”

“You’ve trusted me with your life for years. I could hardly refuse to return the favor.”

“Thank you,” said Bond solemnly, meaning it.

“You figured out I booked passage on a freighter quickly enough,” said Q. “Tell me, where would you guess I departed from?”

“Not knowing when you boarded, I would guess Le Havre or Rotterdam. Le Havre is the last port before New York, and the shortest travel from London which could be an advantage or a disadvantage, since it’s the first place a search is likely to look. It’s also smaller port so less security, but possibly easier to be spotted. It’s a trade-off. Rotterdam adds a day of travel by ship, but is a much larger port, so perhaps easier to get lost in the bustle, but more scrutiny...”

Q nodded. “I wish it weren’t that transparent. But I don’t think anyone would expect my first choice of destination to be the states… I did leave from Rotterdam, but the original plan had been Le Havre. I had to move up the timetable by a day.”

“What happened?”

“Moneypenny.”

Bond raised his eyebrows in question.

“Alec, you might as well come over here,” Q said, then added to Bond. “He hasn’t heard this part either and it will save the embarrassment of telling it twice.”

“What was it you said?” asked Hardison, sitting down next to Q, “ _Someday_ it will be hilarious?”

“You’ll almost certainly find it hilarious today,” he said to Hardison, and then to Bond. “After the explosion that supposedly killed you, R and I initially split the task of monitoring the emergency response and getting a preliminary report to M. I was also hiding any traces of your survival while purportedly looking for just those clues in and around the warehouse. You didn’t leave much for me to do. For which I’m grateful, it was a busy night.”

Bond nodded. “Did you figure out how I got out?”

“I suspect so. I knew when you swapped watches with the weapons dealer. I made it identical to his for a reason.”

Bond looked impressed but puzzled.

“Your heart rate is unusually low. Closer to the range of a professional athlete’s than what was showing for the final 22 hours of the mission. It was clearly being worn by someone other than you. I had to program an algorithm that altered the data before storing it so no one would spot the discrepancy later.

“I assume you lied about one or both of the doors that I couldn’t see being closed or blocked. You did a thorough job of keeping them out of the camera’s view even while moving it around to show me that fireball. My guess is that you fired the seventh shot from near a door and tossed the Walther and your comm toward what we’d assume was your corpse. Thank you, by the way, I got to see nearly 3 seconds of explosion before your phone failed. 318 frames at 120 frames per second… It was _very_ pretty in slow motion.” He tilted his head and raised a ‘How’d I do?’ eyebrow.

“That’s more or less how it went, yes.”

“After the first few hours, I put R in charge of the branch and pretended to investigate what went wrong with the watch detonator. I assumed that I could play obsessive guilt-ridden boffin for a few days before anyone intervened. Particularly since Mallory couldn’t very well admit he knew what had happened. He also couldn’t say that I _shouldn’t_ be acting as if I thought I’d accidentally killed an agent.”

“I started setting up the fake suicide in one of the munitions test bunkers. And threatened grievous bodily harm to any minion who interrupted me. At the same time, Alec and I were identifying some records MI6 had so that they could be destroyed and laying some false trails about what I was supposedly doing or _would_ be doing. For example, several cameras would need to see or not see me on the last day I was there.”

“But Moneypenny…” prompted Bond.

“Moneypenny. The third morning after your ‘death’, I let her entice me out of the bunker to feed me breakfast.” Q’s cheeks reddened and he rubbed his forehead.

“And…?”

“She dosed me with something.” He chuckled ruefully. “I woke up seven hours later. Covered in a blanket on the couch in my office. She’d pinned a note to my shirt saying to see her when I got up or next time I’d wake up in psych.”

Bond snorted. “Sounds like Moneypenny. I could have told you that you needed to reassure her on day two…”

Alec was watching Q, Bond noted. He didn’t look particularly amused.

“I got… focused. There was a lot to do.” said Q defensively. “I’m lucky she and R only thought I needed sleep. If they’d dug into what I was doing, I might have been caught and would’ve really ended up in psych, on a suicide watch. I hate those.”

Q was staring into his mug as he spoke and missed the look Bond and Hardison shared. Bond widened his eyes in a subtle ‘did I hear that right?’. Hardison responded with the slightest nod of his head.

“Anyway, I’d already planned to go home that evening to look in on my cats. So, when I checked in with Moneypenny, I played up realizing that I’d been overdoing it. I promised that I would take a night to recover my perspective and thanked her for forcing me to be sensible.

“Then I texted Alec to let him know I had to change the plan and leave the next evening. I couldn’t risk Moneypenny and R finding a way to override my clearances before I got out. I’d planned a day of things appearing back to normal just in case I needed extra time for anything, so it didn’t affect the plan at MI6 as much as it might have. Still rushed of course, thanks to the day Moneypenny pinched. And it meant I didn’t get another night at home to have a second go at printing a better prosthetic.”

“That reminds me. Alec… err… Trevelyan said Tanner adopted your cats.”

“Good. I hated to leave them,” said Q with real regret.

“I wouldn’t have expected Tanner to be the one who did that…”

“Oh yes, his kids will adore them. Mallory wouldn’t have done it. R’s son is allergic. And Moneypenny is a dog person.” Q shrugged and drank the last remnants of his tea. “Had to be Tanner.”

“Can I get you more hot water? Fresh tea bag?” asked Hardison.

“Yes, both please. Thanks Alec.” Hardison slid out of the booth and Q followed. “I need a break for a moment, excuse me.” He grabbed his crutches.

Bond and Hardison watched him head toward the men’s room. Then Hardison turned toward Bond. “You know that story isn’t funny, right? Concerned co-workers talk to you, or maybe HR in a rough situation. They don’t drug you unconscious and threaten you with psych holds. And then he had to pretend to be _grateful that she did it_.”

Bond sighed, giving Hardison a grim look. Parker and Spencer had turned to look at them as he said, “We have a different perspective.” He gestured to indicate he meant Hardison and himself, not himself and Q. “Headquarters can be very isolated from normal life.” He paused, trying to decide how to explain MI6. “It’s a pressure cooker and a fishbowl and… you know what he did right? The combination of responsibility and expectation that went with that job?” Hardison nodded. “Lord knows I can’t pretend I’m normal, but field agents get away. We interact with… regular people sometimes.” He looked thoughtfully at Hardison. “Are you going to say something to him?”

“I will, but not right now.” Hardison sighed. “He’s got a lot to tell you and it would… distract him.”

“A few weeks ago, before this all started, I would’ve said that I knew Q fairly well,” said Bond choosing his words carefully. “After all, I’ve worked with him for years.” He looked at these three people that Q clearly trusted. “You have to understand, I _barely recognize_ him. _This_ man, is not who he _has been_ , at least since he became quartermaster.”

“I know.” said Hardison somberly. “Want more coffee? I’ll grab you some.”

Bond held out his mug, then looked over to the other man seated at the bar. “Ever known someone who’s been undercover too long?” Eliot nodded once. Bond inclined his head meaningfully toward the hallway where Q had gone.

Eliot nodded again, then twitched his chin toward the back of the pub as Q reappeared in the hallway.

Q returned to the table and thanked Hardison, who’d reoccupied his seat at the bar. “Where were we?” he asked Bond while busying himself brewing his tea.

“You blew up seven watches in a munitions test bunker in order to fake your own death.”

“No,” he said with a puzzled frown, “I didn’t. I wonder if that’s what Mallory is saying, or just the usual garbling of rumor. There was only one watch and one Walther with six bullets already fired out of the clip.

“I recorded a video of myself sitting on what would supposedly become a funeral pyre explaining how you died. Showed myself setting the watch to detonate in one minute and said I hadn’t decided whether to wait out the time or put the seventh bullet in my brain first.

“But that I wasn’t cruel enough to make anyone watch either of those, so I would turn off the camera before I started the timer. “

“Christ, Q.” breathed Bond.

“Personal statement,” repeated Q. “I set it up so that the bunker would unlock, and the video would be sent at 0800 the following morning to Mallory, Tanner, Moneypenny, and R. By that time, there would be nothing left in the bunker besides ash and shredded equipment. And with a bit of luck, I’d be out of the country and on that freighter. The timer on the watch was really set to 30 minutes. I left the building as if I was going home for the day while avoiding being seen in person by anyone. A colleague of Alec’s picked me up nearby. Alec made it look like the real security and CCTV footage of me leaving was faked.”

“When R checks inventory, she’ll see that the Walther in the bunker was one coded to you. Which reminds me…” he placed a small case on the table between them. “This one doesn’t exist. Happy Christmas.”

“You re-coded a Walther you built for me to your print?”

Q shook his head and opened the case. He picked up the gun, keeping the muzzle pointed away from everyone in the room. The green light that indicated that the gun was ready to fire lit when the grip touched his palm. “ _Every_ Walther was coded to me. I tested each weapon personally before issuing it, every time one left the armory. And I would not tolerate a weapon in Q-branch that I could not fire at need.” He replaced the Walther in its case and pushed it across the table to Bond.

“I set up the bunker with fuel and some changes to ventilation to create a makeshift crematorium. Hot enough for long enough that they wouldn’t find DNA, just ashes and fragments of bone. I left a pair of glasses, my prosthetic, and some other belongings that would make it appear I was inside when the watch detonated.”

Q sighed with regret and looked away. “R should have found more or less exactly what I wanted her to.”

“That seems thorough,” said Bond. “I suppose I expect nothing less from you.”

Q smiled faintly, acknowledging the compliment. “What are they telling the remaining agents? I presume you’ve been in contact with 006.”

“Well, he had the method wrong.”

“Not that surprising. What are they saying about _me_?”

Bond looked uncomfortable.

“I promise. Nothing will shock me,” said Q. “They’re not that creative.”

“They’re going with an unstable genius narrative,” said Bond after a long pause.

“See? Not shocked,” said Q. “Predictable. Almost insultingly predictable in fact.”

“Past unspecified trauma,” continued Bond.

“Check,” said Q.

“First major loss of an agent since you were promoted.”

“Check.”

“Guilt over making a critical error.”

“Check.”

“Ah…” Bond paused.

Q raised his eyebrows impatiently. “Spit it out 007,” he ordered.

“History of suicidal ideation,” said Bond reluctantly.

“And check,” said Q without changing expression. He sipped his tea.

“Q, I…,” began Bond.

“It lent credence to my narrative too,” Q looked Bond in the eye. “Why _wouldn’t_ I use a weapon I happen to have in my arsenal?”

Bond paused, considering whether to respond. _To hell with it,_ he thought. “You know the answer to that perfectly well, quartermaster.”

Q cocked his head but said nothing.

“You don’t use a weapon,” said Bond carefully, watching Q’s face, “when the risk of collateral damage is unacceptable.”

Q went still. Bond waited. Watched Q’s jaw tighten.

Q broke eye contact first, glancing to the side where Hardison sat and then down to the table. “Did 006 tell you anything else?” Q asked after a moment and another sip of tea.

“R is furious. Moneypenny is distraught. Neither are talking,” said Bond, accepting Q’s change of subject. “Trevalyan didn’t have a read on Tanner or Mallory; they’re keeping out of sight.”

“I do wish I could have told R. I calculate a small chance that if she figures out what I did, she’ll hunt me down herself. One to two percent maybe.”

“And the other 98 percent?”

“Call it a three or four percent chance she’ll tell M her suspicions. 95 percent chance she’ll keep it to herself.”

“Why would she do that?”

“She did that cost-benefit analysis. She gets it.”

“Do you _think_ she’ll figure it out?”

“I’d lay odds of one in five. And they’re only _that_ favorable to me because I didn’t leave myself a way to retrieve my cats.” He looked at Bond. “What questions do you have?”

“Why not just tell me your exit strategy when you briefed me that night?”

Q sighed. “Because 00 agents are, by necessity, suspicious bastards and convincing liars. There was always the possibility, however small, that you wouldn’t believe a word of it and that you’d go directly to Mallory with everything I said.” He shrugged and looked back at Bond, “Perhaps I ought to apologize for not trusting you, but I’m not sorry.”

“If that’s the case, how can you trust me now?”

“I know you _didn’t_ say anything to M. So, either you believed me or the order to kill you was some sort of Byzantine plot to see if I’d obey that’s still playing out. But that isn’t Mallory’s style, so I’ll reject that hypothesis. Other questions?”

“Why does a hacker join the Royal Air Force in the first place?”

Q looked into the distance for a moment. “I joined the military for access to tech I couldn’t get any other way. Then Al Qaeda and the Americans’ ‘war on terror’ happened, and suddenly we were involved in a land war in Asia.”

“And MI6?”

“MI6’s toys were even shinier. Obviously.”

The answer rang false, but Bond decided not to pursue it just yet. “An underground dance venue called Callahan’s is closed for renovations. Do you know anything about that?”

“News to me,” said Q innocently. “I _have_ been out of touch for a bit. Any word on when they’ll reopen?”

“Just a couple weeks they claim. Seems like they’re redoing some wiring, and they tore down the sound booth.”

“Sensible. No one has used that sound booth for ages. The light and sound boards are always on stage with the DJ.” Q’s smile was sly. “And I heard some amateur did the original wiring. The owners might be thinking of selling and they need to make sure everything is up to code.”

“Why would the owners sell?”

Q shook his head. “It was mostly a labor of love at this point, I suspect. Not much profit in it.”

“And just who are Ian Wright and Luke Izuluhamba?”

“Who?” Q asked with more transparently fake innocence.

“The owners of the place?” said Bond patiently.

“Hmm. Ian Wright… Were you the sort to watch Dr Who? The first Doctor’s companions were Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright... maybe a fan made up the name by combining them? And well… Izuluhamba means “heaven walk” which sounds to me like Skywalker _very_ poorly translated into Xhosa, so _that’s_ clearly a pseudonym.”

Bond rolled his eyes.

Q looked thoughtful. “It’s a good time for them to renovate, since Mike isn’t there anymore.”

“Mike?”

“The sound guy,” said Q. “He was the DJ the night you attended a rave for no apparent reason?”

Bond sighed, he supposed he shouldn’t be surprised Q had spotted him. “And what’s _his_ name a reference to?”

“It’s just a pun, Bond.”

Bond stared at Q for a moment and then groaned as it sank in. “Mike. Sound. And you think _Hardison_ needs better jokes?”

“I think I like this guy after all,” said Hardison from the bar.

“I take my laughs where I can get them,” Q smirked. “His last name is Sprecher.1 ”

Bond translated in his head from German and groaned again. “You’re a menace.”

“That is, much to my surprise, not a unique observation,” said Q, amused.

“OK Q. Final question. What is this really all about?”

“For that Bond, you might want to get yourself a drink.”

Bond looked Q in the eye for a moment. “I’ll stick with the coffee if it’s all the same to you.”

“As you will,” said Q, sipping his tea. “I have a request to make of you, and a story to tell.”

“A request?” asked Bond.

“Your history with MI6 suggests that you’ll eventually tire of whatever you do when you aren’t being a covert operative and you’ll go back. If —or when— you feel the need to do that, I’d like you to talk to me again. Send a message to the same number I gave you before, and I’ll set up a meet.”

“HMS Temeraire again?”

“No. This time it is RMS Carpathia.”2

“I don’t think I know that one?”

“Look it up some time,” said Q. “It’s a remarkable story.”

“That’s not the story you’re going to tell?”

“No. Though we should talk about Lusitania for a moment before I get to that.”

“I admit I didn’t understand the choice,” said Bond. Q cocked his head but said nothing, so Bond continued. “World War I. Sunk by the Germans. Over a thousand passengers died. Several were American, so that added to the pressure on the United States to enter the conflict. There was an argument at the time over whether it was actually carrying armaments in violation of treaty that would have justified the German submarine attack or whether, as the British insisted, it was simply a passenger vessel.”

Q nodded and gestured for Bond to keep going.

“Of course, it was eventually admitted, back in the 80s, that it _was_ carrying munitions,” said Bond. “So the Germans were in the right.”

“No,” said Q. “The Germans were correct or perhaps just guessed the truth. To say that they were _in the_ _right_ implies that the deaths of 1,198 passengers were justified. By the same token, to suggest that the British were _in the right_ , to protest the innocence of the ship in the wake of the casualties, implies it was appropriate to use civilians as shields for transporting munitions into a war zone in direct violation of a treaty. The sinking of Lusitania is about government perfidy getting people killed. It seemed… appropriate to the story I need to tell you.

“In 2005, before military operations officially began in the region, a 00 agent died in Kandahar. I assume that you knew him.”

Bond nodded. “Dalton, yes. He was the previous 004. Died in a plane crash near the end of a mission.”

“He was _in_ a plane crash, but that’s not how he died.”

“Ah?... Oh yes, the pilot was killed in the crash, Dalton and,” he paused to think, “one other survived. They were attacked by the militants who shot down the plane. Private jet, posing as drug dealers or something. Dalton was shot, the survivor…,” Bond stopped abruptly and looked hard at Q.

Q took a sip of his tea. “The survivor was an RAF electronics expert seconded to MI6 to help with the gear Dalton was tasked with bringing to potential allies. No one in Q-branch at the time was up to duty in a combat zone as dangerous as Kandahar.”

“You.”

“Yes,” Q had wrapped his hands around his mug, fingers clenching. “Dalton said he thought the bullet went in through a gap in the side of his body armor. But it _pierced_ his armor. No one was firing anything at us that should’ve been able to do that, but it did. It seemed a terrible irony, that an equipment flaw should kill someone who’d just completed his mission and survived a plane crash. He died about 40 minutes later. There wasn’t anything either of us could do.

“It was just after sunset. As if he’d timed it for maximum drama.” Q tried to smile. “I always wished I could give him shit about that. He’d have thought it was hilarious.”

Bond puffed a laugh at the thought. “Yes, he would have.”

“He’d pulled me out of a burning plane wreck and got a tourniquet on my leg. I’d be dead if it weren’t for him.” Q stopped speaking and took a breath, held it, exhaled slowly, took another breath, held it. Bond recognized the pattern for calming anxiety and waited for Q to continue.

Q removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “This is… difficult to talk about. My apologies.”

“You can take all the time you need Q. I’m listening.” said Bond sincerely.

It was apparent that Q had not expected this response, and he closed his eyes mastering some unanticipated emotion before opening them again. “Thank you,” he said.

“Of course.”

“So. That’s how I came to the attention of MI6 and why I don’t fly,” said Q. “I was rescued the following day. I had my first panic attack on a transport back to England for medical treatment. Fortunately, sedatives were available in quantity.

“M and my predecessor started recruiting me before I left the hospital in London. Apparently, Dalton had put in a good word for me. I joined because I thought I could help ensure that no other agent died because of defective equipment.” His wry smile returned, “and for the shiny toys of course.”

Bond felt pieces fit into place. “And when Mallory ordered you to give me defective equipment…”

“Well, yes. But call that the proximate, not the ultimate cause. It isn’t the whole story, Bond. Not even close,” Q raised his mug and gestured toward the bar. “Are you sure you don’t want that drink?”

Bond nodded.

“I joined Q-branch in 2006. Boothroyd allowed me some time to pursue projects of my own. So I worked on body armor improvements. The first thing I discovered was that the material being used had a very finicky manufacturing process. I’ll spare you the details, but in brief, one step toward the end, if done wrong, could result in a material that appeared flawless, but was not nearly resilient enough. It was a known issue and each batch should’ve been rigorously tested both by the manufacturer and by Q branch and caught before it was ever used.”

“Dalton’s armor came from a bad batch,” guessed Bond

“It did,” agreed Q. “His was the only armor made from that lot of material, which was subsequently destroyed. At the time, I assumed that a review of Dalton’s death led to the discovery of the bad lot and its destruction. An embarrassing oversight in quality control, but…” Q stopped again.

“At the time?”

“Yes. Anyway, I spent six years making changes to body armor as my side project. We stopped using that material, I found a way to make the side panels more protective. Doing what I could to avoid a repeat.

“And then I became quartermaster and gained access to paper files that I hadn’t known existed. After we cleaned up the worst of Silva’s mess, I found a record of Dalton’s last mission. Not the official one I’d read ages before. I had no idea why it would be there, perhaps because he’d died in the field? I read it mostly out of curiosity.” Q’s anger was back. He gripped his mug with both hands and Bond could see him shaking.

“Kandahar had been a decoy mission,” he said, voice flat and angry, “like sending you after a nonexistent bioweapon. M gave the order, not to Q, but to one of his underlings, to provide 004 with defective body armor and she sent him into a war zone with an objective that offered no strategic benefit.

“I am _reliably,_ ” Q gave the word a bitter twist, “informed that R’s cost-benefit analysis calculations fail to take into consideration such intangibles as the ‘current political landscape’ and ‘good will among nations’. But if there was a justification for why Dalton was no longer valuable to MI6, I never found it. I don’t know if Dalton realized MI6 had betrayed him, or if he thought it was just a lucky shot.

“There were four people on that plane. The pilot’s name was Geoffrey. He was 22. There was another soldier with us for security, Tyler. He was 22 as well. I was 24. I spent my 25th birthday in a military hospital. MI6 killed Dalton. They killed Geoffrey and Tyler. They nearly killed me. All over a meaningless objective. They took their sacrifices and threw them in the _rubbish_. And then they _recruited_ me, and nine years later I was ordered to do the same thing to another agent.

“You asked me, several weeks ago, hadn’t I heard ‘agents were _expendable_?’.”

Bond winced, guessing the effect that phrase must have had on Q.

“You all say it. But Dalton was the first agent to tell me that. He used nearly your exact words… ‘Mission objective secured; my survival is less vital.’ Closest I’ve ever come to a combat flashback in the middle of running an op.”

Bond could see the same anger he’d seen after his penultimate mission. ‘Not interchangeable, replaceable, or disposable,’ Q had said then. Now Bond understood what Q’s next sentence, ‘I probably know that better than anyone,’ had meant. “I’m sorry Q...” Bond began.

“You couldn’t have known,” Q shrugged. “But that’s why I snapped at you.”

“You had already received the order from Mallory.”

“Yes. And I knew they were feeding you incomplete intel. Dalton’s last couple mission reports mentioned poor intel and concerns about it affecting his or other agents’ effectiveness. I didn’t see that for what it was until _your_ last few missions. Embarrassing naiveté on my part,” he shook his head, frowning.

“I looked more carefully at the patterns of agent deaths. I found more of M’s files and those of her predecessor. I believe I found two additional 00s, who died in the field, whose deaths were deliberate. And that is unacceptable to me.”

“Dalton —or this pattern you say you found— is that why you had R run that cost-benefit analysis?” asked Bond.

“Yes. It was when Mallory was still new to his role. He was an outsider. I thought things might change. And he was ex-military; I hoped ‘leave no one behind’ might add weight to the argument. But I presented it as R’s work of which I was… slightly skeptical.” Q tilted his head expectantly.

Bond felt like he was finally beginning to catch up. “You wanted Mallory to come to _you_ with a kill order, not to your subordinates.”

A hint of Q’s feral smile returned. “Exactly. If he was going to play the game the same way his predecessors did, I needed him to believe that I would not hesitate to kill an agent if ordered to do so. It’s the longest con I’ve ever pulled. When I said, back at Callahan’s, that I knew M wouldn’t have hesitated to order the death of an agent? I wasn’t guessing. That wasn’t my _impression_ of her. I know she did exactly that, because I read those reports. I’ve seen the orders. I also knew she wouldn’t have given me that order, because of Dalton.”

“Christ, Q,” said Bond, “Why didn’t you leave MI6 when you found out?”

“I told you at Callahan’s, I couldn’t figure out how to do it and live. They thought I was too dangerous to be anywhere but at MI6 taking orders.

“Shortly after I joined, M made sure I was aware that she knew about Alec. Who he was, what he did, and what he meant to me. It remains the most elegant threat I’ve ever witnessed. Just a few sentences mentioning a connection she knew I had. He was the obvious person I’d go to if I needed help. She made sure I knew I couldn’t without endangering him.

“When I became quartermaster, I removed every _hint_ of Alec from MI6’s files. To the best of my knowledge, Mallory doesn’t know he exists.

“If I’m being completely honest, Silva showed me a way out. No one had imagined he was still alive.”

“And why haven’t you burned MI6 to the ground like Silva wanted to?”

Q threw up his hands and looked at the ceiling in frustration. “Because I’m _not actually_ a super villain Bond. Just a hacker with an unusual skillset.” He paused, then continued more evenly, “and as long as I stayed, I thought I could protect my agents. And shelter my staff from the worst… abuses. I stayed for Dalton. For Geoffrey and Tyler.”

“I suspect both M’s used my sense of responsibility against me to some extent.” Q fidgeted with his mug. “And maybe that’s where I got lucky.”

“Lucky?” Bond asked in disbelief.

“Lucky.” agreed Q. “Because good hackers? Have a better chance of noticing when they’ve been hacked. It took me longer than I’d like to admit, but I got there.”

“You can hack people?” asked Bond dubiously.

“What part of ‘cleverly manipulating 00 agents to work more effectively’ did you think _wasn’t_ hacking?” Q asked with a hint of derision.

“Except 004 who didn’t want to talk to you,” reminded Bond.

“Oh no. She and I worked brilliantly together. It was like running a mission by means of haiku. An elegant intellectual challenge for both of us.” Q smiled fondly. “Once we tried to do a remote mission briefing through an online Scrabble game. Almost worked too.”

“How is it, Q, that you continue to astound me?”

“It could be that you’re easily impressed,” said Q dryly. “But I suspect it is my having revealed next to nothing about myself in the three years we’ve known each other.”

“You hacked MI6,” said Bond.

“It seemed fair. They hacked me first. I’m supposed to have been one of the good guys, serving queen and country. And my friend the renegade hacker,” he gestured toward Alec, “regularly did more good in the world, while I protected the status quo.” Q looked down. “While I lied about what was in the hold of the Lusitania. And with my laptop and my Earl Grey, racked up a body count that exceeds yours by a factor of ten. I had to get out before I really did end up ashes in a bunker.”

“What are you going to do?” Bond asked, realizing he’d echoed the question he’d asked at Callahan’s just three weeks earlier.

“I’ll need to keep a low profile for a while, but Alec and I have a couple ideas. Someone is trying to influence elections in multiple countries. We don’t approve. We might take a whack at the Great Firewall. And, I need some time to… adjust.

“Tomorrow morning, two weeks after your ‘death’, the remaining 00s and R will receive a video from me. It is an extended version of the video that I sent to Mallory and the others. In addition to describing my orders to kill you, I tell them what I just told you about Dalton. I believe they all deserve to know.”

Bond’s eyes widened. “You’ve never seemed the type to throw a grenade in a random direction.”

“Is that what it sounds like to you?” asked Q, swirling the tea remaining in his mug. “If the flaws in a system are too significant to fix, then it should be scrapped and rebuilt. If you don’t, _someone_ will come in and exploit those flaws. Tell me. What do you think of when you hear my voice?”

He thought for a moment. “Competent. Reliable. Trusted.” Bond shook his head, looking for a word to encompass it all. “Lifeline.”

Q nodded acknowledgment. “That’s my exploit. All of you have trusted me with your lives for years. The remaining agents will listen to my voice one last time. I have some educated guesses about how each will respond.”

“For you, Bond, look up RMS Carpathia. Find a way to serve something that actually deserves the loyalty you’ve given MI6. Contact me if you need a reminder of why you shouldn’t go back.”

“If anyone discovers you’re alive…” said Bond.

Q shrugged. “Then I will, perhaps only briefly, live in very interesting times.”

Bond took a long look at the man seated across from him. He pondered everything Q had said, and what he could possibly say in response. Then his face slowly broke into a smile as he realized what it needed to be. “If that happens,” he said, “send me a message. You’ll have my sword.”

Q gave Bond a warm, delighted smile in return. “I’d be honored. Thank you, Bond.”

“Call me James. We don’t work together anymore.”

“James,” said Q, holding out his hand. “I’m Will.”

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. _German_ : Speaker  Back
> 
> 2\. RMS Carpathia is the only ship that found survivors of Titanic. [Link to Tumblr post](https://mylordshesacactus.tumblr.com/post/170401018158/please-make-a-post-about-the-story-of-the-rms) The story really is remarkable and regularly makes me sob.  Back  
> \--  
> Yes, I chose "Dalton" as my original 00 character's name because Timothy Dalton played the James Bond who went to Afghanistan. I apologize that I killed him off once he got there.


End file.
